名利场:最令人愉快的品酒会

The Friday before last I was treated to one of the most pleasurable wine tastings I can remember. It was not that the wines themselves were the greatest ever. In my time I’ve been lucky enough to enjoy various series of classic and historic vintages. This was not one of those. And at least part of the reason I enjoyed it so much was that it was in such a congenial setting.

不久前我参加了一场品酒会(wine tasting)，那是我参加过的最令人愉快的品酒会之一。我想至少有部分原因是当天的品尝环境非常对我的胃口，而不是因为当天所品尝的葡萄酒特别好——这么多年来我品尝过太多经典和著名的葡萄酒。

It was in a house close to my own that I had long wanted to snoop inside. The 26 bottles were lined up on a pine table in a pretty, light, comfortable dining area with a wooden floor, lots of cookbooks and interesting bits and pieces round about, a fire glowing in the grate, intriguing family photographs, unscented flowers and a view over a welltended garden.

品尝会的举办地点距离我住所不远，是一座我很久以来总是想要一探究竟的房子，而这次品尝会正好让我得以见识它的真面目。在漂亮、明亮且舒适的木地板用餐区，二十六瓶葡萄酒整齐地排列在一张松木桌上。活动处还展示着很多烹饪类书籍，壁炉中的火焰快乐地跳跃着，各处的小摆件和家庭照片也非常有趣。因为品酒会的关系，花朵都是无香的。屋外花园也非常美丽，可以看出主人常常用心打理。

The tasting had been organised by a genuine grape enthusiast, not to say grape obsessive, whose interest in wine in general and unusual grape varieties in particular is so marked that he prefers to remain anonymous lest his clients (who belong to another field entirely) feel neglected. After ensuring I had everything I could desire (decent glass, tasting sheet, spittoon, water and, nowadays, chair) Mr Grape Obsessive tactfully withdrew to his study, just within sight, while Mrs Grape Obsessive showed me where I could refuel on Sally Clarke’s delicacies. (I may not eat much when slurping and spitting but there is nothing that stimulates the appetite more effectively than wine tasting, so provision of something more nourishing than a Carr’s water biscuit is always appreciated.)

这场品酒会的主办人即便不能被称作葡萄迷先生，但也称得上是葡萄爱好者，他对葡萄酒和各种葡萄品种尤其感兴趣，喜欢用匿名的方式办活动，以免客户（处于与葡萄酒完全不相干行业的客户）感到自己受到忽视。在我确认了品尝会所需物品都已经齐备（正确的酒杯、品尝表格、吐酒桶、水以及椅子）之后，葡萄迷先生自然地退回到自己的岗位上继续劳作，葡萄迷女士（即他的太太）告诉我如果感到饿了，可以享用莎莉克拉克(Sally Klarke)的美食。在品酒会中不能吃太多东西，不过没有任何事情能够比品酒会更让人胃口大开，所以如果活动中能够有比卡尔牌薄脆饼干(Carr’s water biscuit)更有营养的食物当然令人非常开心。

A wine professional might have arranged the wines by colour and then by ascending order of body or sweetness. But to Mr Grape Obsessive, the grapes were the thing, so he arranged the bottles in alphabetical order by name of grape variety – the theme being wines made from exotic grape varieties that he had picked up on his travels over the past four years. He told me that he thoroughly researches any new region his work takes him to so that he knows in advance exactly what to look for. “You can find the most extraordinary things in wine shops,” he assured me. I gathered from Mrs Grape Obsessive that she was delighted that at long last these hoarded bottles were being opened and would soon be out of the house.

葡萄酒专业人士安排品尝顺序时通常会按照颜色进行区分，接着再按照酒体或甜度进行升序排序。但是对于葡萄迷先生来说，葡萄品种是永远的主角，所以他将所有的酒款以葡萄品种名称进行字母表式的排序——品酒会的主题也定为主人四年来周游列国所收集的异国品种所酿造的葡萄酒。他告诉我说，每当出差之前，他都会对前往地做事先的产地研究，所以动身之前就已经决定了将要购买什么葡萄酒。最后，他非常确信地告诉我：“在葡萄酒商店中，你总是能够找到最特别的东西。”后来我从葡萄迷女士那里得知，最后所有的葡萄酒都被打开品尝令她非常开心，她也很乐意来宾们将打开而没有喝完的美酒带回家享用。

Since there was no particular vinous rhyme or reason to the order of bottles, I sat down where there was a space, which happened to be beside the first bottle of Uhudler I had ever tried. Mr Grape Obsessive, of course, had both a white and red version of this questionable southeastern Austrian speciality that is made from American hybrids. It was a big mistake to start with the pale red Uhudler, made by Pfeiffer from Concord – the common labrusca grape responsible for so much grape juice and jelly/jam in the US – and the much more obscure American hybrid Ripatella. Do you know how American grape juice smells? Or, indeed, anything grapeflavoured in the US. “Foxy” has become the accepted term for this unforgettable smell that is somewhere between fraises des bois and damp fur. I tried to rinse out my glass to ready it for the next wine, made like 99 per cent of all wines from the European vine species. I failed and had to get a new glass. I’m not saying American vine species are evil. But their grapes and wine sure taste odd to palates more used to conventional wine aromas made from European grapes.

考虑到当天葡萄酒排序的方式比较特殊，我觉得从哪里开始尝起都无所谓，因此就随便找了一个空位就坐了。而这个空座面对的，正好是我曾经尝过的一种葡萄酒——乌德勒(Uhudler)。这种备受争议的奥地利东南部特有葡萄酒有红和白两种类型，采用美洲杂交品种(American Hybrid)酿造，葡萄迷女士当天也为我们准备了红和白各一瓶。从淡红的乌德勒红葡萄酒开始品尝实在是一个大错误，当天的酒款由普菲佛(Pfeiffer)采用康科德(Concord)和里帕特拉(Ripatella)这两个品种酿造——前者是美洲种葡萄(labrusca)，在美国主要用于榨汁或制作果冻和果酱；后者是美洲杂交种，品种特点比康科德更加模糊。你知道美洲葡萄汁闻起来是什么感觉吗？或者我应该问美国所有带有葡萄味道特点的东西闻起来是什么感觉。“狐骚味”应该是一个很有代表性的词汇，这种味道介于野生草莓(fraises des bois)和湿皮毛之间，很容易就能够给人留下极其深刻的印象。品尝完这款貌似唯一采用美洲种酿造的葡萄酒之后，我尝试通过多次涮杯来清除味道，不过屡战屡败。最后没办法，只好换了一个新酒杯。我倒不是在控诉美洲葡萄种有多么邪恶，但是对于习惯了欧洲葡萄种风格的人来说，它们的味道实在很怪。

As coauthor of a book on 1,368 vine varieties (it was tactfully left out in a prominent position in front of the fire), I had come across many of these exotic grape varieties before. But Mr Grape Obsessive gave me my first opportunity to taste Resi or Rèze, whose 700th anniversary was recently celebrated in its native Valais at an event organised by my coauthor José Vouillamoz. The 2011 version – made by the obscure local grape specialists, the Chanton family of Visp – was apparently the star of the anniversary celebrations, while Mr GO’s 2006 was the star of his tasting for me. It had developed beautifully into something that managed to be both tangy and somehow burnished yet seemed to have lots of life ahead of it too. In Wine Grapes we note that there are just two hectares of this historic Valais grape variety left. There should be more, and recently José discovered, through his groundbreaking work analysing the DNA of grape varieties, that a few ancient Rèze vines can be found in Savoie in the French Alps and that the variety is related to several others, suggesting it was once much more widely planted.

作为一本介绍了1368个葡萄品种的书籍的作者之一（这本书当时就摆放在壁炉前的一个显要位置），我遇到过很多外来的葡萄品种，不过葡萄迷先生给了我第一次品尝雷西(Resi, Rèze)的机会。与我共著葡萄品种书籍的何塞弗拉莫兹(José Vouillamoz)最近举办了一场庆祝该品种七百周年的活动，举办地正是其发源地瓦莱(Valais)。2011年份的雷西葡萄酒由维斯普(Visp)地区非常擅长该品种的尚顿(Chanton)家族酿造，是历年庆祝会的主角；而此次品尝会中大放光彩的则是葡萄迷先生带来的同厂酿造的2006年份——这款酒发展得非常好，既不失劲道又显得平滑，目前来看还拥有陈酿潜质。《酿酒葡萄》(Wine Grapes)曾提到，这个源自瓦莱的葡萄品种目前种植面积仅剩两公顷，不过何塞最近的一项具有突破性的葡萄品种脱氧核糖核酸(DNA)研究分析表明，在法国境内阿尔卑斯山(Alps)地区的萨瓦(Savoie)找到了古老的雷西植株。不仅如此，何塞的研究还发现，雷西与其他一些葡萄品种有着亲缘关系，这表明其种植范围曾甚为广泛。